N. Korea lacks financial ability to build light water reactor: minister

SEOUL, April 15 (Yonhap) -- North Korea lacks the financial resources to build a
light-water reactor, Seoul's unification minister said Wednesday, refuting
Pyongyang's threat a day earlier to build one.
"It is a tremendous amount of money, compared to North Korea's economic ability.
We believe North Korea at this time does not have the ability to do it in a
normal manner," Hyun In-taek said in an interview with Yonhap News Agency.
A light-water reactor can cost 10 times as much as the rocket it recently fired,
he said.
North Korea said on Tuesday that it was withdrawing from nuclear disarmament
talks and will consider building a light-water reactor on its own, protesting the
U.N. Security Council statement condemning its April 5 rocket launch.
South Korea's state-run think tank has said the rocket launch may have cost North
Korea between US$3 million and $5 million.
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